Integrative Medicine and Concierge Clinics

How Innovative Approaches Combine to Provide Better Health Care at an Affordable Cost

Before the modern era, doctors were usually paid directly by patients for their services. Sometimes this meant that doctors were paid with chickens or apple pies, but that was during a time when the needs and desires of their patients were the primary focus.

During that era, doctors were generalists treating all conditions for every member of the family from babies to grandparents. With the explosion of medical science over the last 50 years, specialists emerged with high skill levels who could implement the new knowledge and technology.

The existence of specialists has been key to the power of modern medicine. As more and more patients are getting their care from doctors with limited knowledge and skill outside their specialty, though, it has also become a weakness.

The Re-Emergence of the Family Physician To restore the balance between the need for specialization and the need for healers who see and treat the patient as an entire being as well as a member of a family, community and environment, modern medicine has come full circle with the emergence of Family Medicine as a specialty.

The Family Physician is trained to be a generalist, looking at each patient as an integrated system (instead of organ systems or problem/disease type) and caring for people of both sexes and all ages.

Utilizing the Family Physician as its center, an emerging movement in health care, referred to as Integrative Medicine, seeks to improve health by utilizing a complete and comprehensive approach to the treatment of diseases and/or illness.

What is Integrative Medicine? Integrative Medicine is not simply “alternative medicine” that substitutes an herb for a pharmaceutical, nor is it “complementary medicine” that just adds another modality to traditional medical care.

Integrative Medicine is a healing-oriented approach that takes into account all dimensions of a patient physical, intellectual and spiritual. It sees patients as both individuals as well as members of their family and community. The emphasis is on the doctor-patient relationship and integrates conventional medicine with alternative therapies and healing traditions. Integrative physicians attempt to both learn from their patients and to be living examples by continually improving their own health. Currently 26 medical centers, led by the University of Arizona, and including Harvard and Duke, have programs for the study of integrative medicine.

To learn more about integrative medicine visit

Is Your Doctor Working for the Insurance Company? Another attribute of modern health care is the dominance of third party health payers. During World War II, in an attempt to circumvent wage freezes, employers began offering employer paid health insurance, which trend continued and grew long after the war was over. In the 1960’s, government started paying for health care for the elderly and the poor. In the US today, the vast majority has their health insurance provided by a third party.

The increased demand for health care and new technology created higher health care costs. To control those costs, 3rd party payers developed increasingly more complex payment programs. Consequently, more doctors are working directly for insurance companies, government agencies and hospitals. In this system, who then is working for the patient?

The Trend Toward Patient-Centered Clinics As dissatisfaction has grown, the yearning for restoration of the doctor-patient relationship has accelerated. Just like the Integrative Medicine movement, there is now a movement underway to change how health care is paid for and to restore the integrity of the doctor-patient relationship. That movement is referred to variously as “Simple Care”, “Concierge Medicine,” or “Patient Centered Medicine.” It is part of a larger movement known as consumer-driven healthcare.

In a patient-centered clinic the doctor must be more accountable to the needs of the patients, who are not bound or coerced by a third-party to see them. Patient-centered clinics often limit their total number of patients in order to provide more individualized care. Many of these clinics can, by stepping out of the third-party bureaucracy, offer care for reduced prices. This has made patient-centered care one of the better options for delivering care to the uninsured. When not beholden to government or insurance providers a doctor has more freedom to make treatment recommendations based on the best interests of the patient.

Concierge clinics generally offer three options for reimbursement for their services. Concierge Medicine is not limited to physicians, or even to general practice. Alternative practitioners such as chiropractors, naturopaths, herbalists, psychologists and massage therapist have long relied on direct payment from their patients. Some medical specialists, like dermatology, never left the old model of fee for service.

The core idea of concierge medicine is that providing more freedom to the patient and doctor will result in overall better health care. In a concierge medical practice, the doctor has only once customer the patient.

To learn more about third-party free, patient-centered medicine, visit the following websites: Society for Innovative Medical Practice Design at www.simpd.org Simple Care at www.simplecare.com The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons at www.aapsonline.org.